USA > Massachusetts > Berkshire County > History of Berkshire County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of its prominent men, Volume I pt 2 > Part 35
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The records of the Plantation of Ashuelot Equivalent have not been preserved, and the history of the township previous to its incorporation as a town in 1784 is therefore somewhat obscure. Its growth previous to the Revolution must have been slow, but was of sterling material in its men and women. The settlers had come in largely under the auspices of the great tory families of the Connecticut valley, and a majority of the most prominent were under this influence, whatever the majority in the mass of the people may have felt. Some pretty clear glimpses into this darkness are found, however, for it is certain that Lieutenant Daniel Kellogg led gallantly a detachment of brave men from " The Equivalent" in some of the battles which occurred when Burgoyne threatened to come down upon the region " like a wolf on the fold." When, owing to the belligerent character of the sheep, the British general and his troops went to Boston in a far different guise, one division passed through Dal- ton, and an absurd notion soon possessed a great many people all over the country that they had buried much British gold on their march. Years afterward men, sometimes coming from a distance, continued to dig for this shadowy treasure; so powerful, from the days of the alchemist down, has even the most illusive hint of gold been to make of men idiots as well as madmen.
As to the general relations of the plantation to the Revolutionary government it is not difficult to form an idea upon historical evidence. The settlers generally had come under the auspices of the proprietors of the original grant, who were mostly loyalists. These proprietors owned
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a large portion of its unimproved lands. Their influence, so far as they dared to exercise it, would doubtless have been against the Revolution ; but it would have been extremely perilous for them to do so, except in the most covert manner. The danger would have been indeed even greater for them than for most others of their class, as we shall see ; for they were under more rigid surveillance. As to the mass of the people they were as faithful to the rights and liberties of their country as those of any other town. At the first meeting of the town, after its incorporation, Captain Abijah Parks was appointed to examine the charge that the place was deficient one man upon the class tax in 1782, and, if it should prove not true. to endeavor to get the sum of $71, 1s., and Sd. charged for that deficiency taken off. This was a case where a draft was made for recruits for the Continental army. Towns were generally divided into classes for this purpose, and each class was required either to furnish its quota or a certain sum of money. Ashuelot Equivalent seems to have formed a class by itself. At the same meeting the town voted that it would " defend in law him or them who may refuse the person or property of any individual that may be taken upon an execution from the treasurer of this common- wealth for the sum charged upon this place as its proportion of the beef tax." This refers to the tax assessed upon the several towns in one of the last years of the war, and required to be paid in beef for the use of the army, continental money having become nearly worthless. It was consid- ered very burdensome, and some of the towns most noted for patriotism were slow in responding, especially if they believed the assessment im- posed upon them unequal. There were many calls upon the towns for men and for taxes during that long and doubtful struggle for independ- ence, and, as Ashuelot Equivalent appears, even upon the strongest state- ment of the case, to have failed to meet only two, it is a fair inference that they met all the rest to the satisfaction of the government.
But whatever Ashuelot Equivalent did in aid of the Revolution. the Revolution did much to make it grow rapidly into the town of Dalton. The prosperity of the Williams family helped to found the town : their misfortunes contributed more to build it up and give it character.
The story is peculiar, and of more than local interest. Israel Wil- liams, of Hatfield, was born in 1709, and graduated from Harvard Col- lege in 1727; five years after the first petition for a grant of townships for settlement in what is now the county of Berkshire, and three after the settlement was actually commenced ; but four years before any consider- able progress had been made. From that time on till the Revolutionary troubles began he was deeply concerned in the settlement of the new ter- ritory, having a proprietary interest in several townships besides " The Equivalent." As the leading local military commander, and as the trusted confidential friend of the royal governors, he took a leading, judicious, and energetic part in the measures which protected the western settle. ments of the province in the last of the French and Indian wars. At the opening of the Revolution he was, and had for many years been, a judge
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in the Court of Common Pleas for Hampshire county. All this involved many "iron-clad " oaths, as we should now call them, of allegiance to the British crown, and moreover a genuine loyalty to it. In an evil hour, in the year 1774, it also led to his appointment as one of the " Manda- mus" councillors, the most odious of the royal appointments in the inte- rior counties. In a moment all his services to his people were forgotten in the patriotic rage of the hour. Even his venerable years were forgot- ten. He was taken by a mob to a school house, at a considerable dis- tance from his home, and shut up in a school room where pitch pine fires were kindled, while the escape of smoke from the chimney was stopped. Under the torture thus inflicted he signed whatever papers his torment- ors presented, but under mental reserve and protest. Afterward it was found by the Hutchinson papers obtained by Dr. Franklin in London that Colonel Williams had recommended the most severe measures against the rebellious provincials. It was this which prompted the coup- let in Trumbull's quaint poem, "McFingall " :
"Have you made Murray look less big Or smoked old Williams to a Whig?"
When these later revelations came he was thrown into Northampton jail, treated with great indignity, and only released on condition that he should make his residence at Ashuelot Equivalent under the surveillance of the Pittsfield committee of inspection and safety. Whether this was at his request, or whether he actually went there, we have no positive evidence to show, but both are probable.
The influence of Judge Williams' son, Deacon William Williams, upon the early character of the town is better defined and more positive. He was born at Hatfield, June 10th, 1734, and graduated at Yale College in 1754, and shortly afterward, having studied law, was admitted to the bar and appointed clerk of the Hampshire County Court. This is a position even now of dignity and importance, but in provincial times, when the judges were as a rule not learned in the law, it had even greater consideration. When the royal courts were suspended, in 1774, there was no more place for their judges or their clerks. The Williamses, father and son, were no longer in office, and were moreover under the ban of polit- ical public opinion. The father had large estates most of which he re- tained, although suffering much from fines and other penalties imposed by the Revolutionary authorities. The son was also a man of consider- able property. But residence at Hatfield being no longer either agree- able or profitable to him, he removed, in the early part of the Revolu- tion, to the western part of Ashuelot Equivalent in which his father had much real estate and where his brother-in-law, Dr. Perez Marsh, was al- ready established. It is possible that he went at the time of his father's enforced migration, and that the two events were connected. The treat- ment which his venerable father received at the hands of the whigs in- spired in the hearts of other members of his family the most intense ha- tred of the Revolution and its supporters, and it could not win for it the
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favor of his good son. William Williams did not become a whig ; but he maintained a quiet spirit which, combined with nobleness and force of character, guided by entire truthfulness, carried him safely and hon- orably, not only through the Revolution, but through the days of the Shays rebellion, which tried men's souls in Western Massachusetts quite as severely as did those of the earlier and longer struggle.
His tory antecedents did not bar his way to popular favor after the war was over, for, besides holding town offices frequently, he was elected. both to the State Senate and House of Representatives. He was town clerk for several years, being the first chosen, and although the records of several Berkshire towns bear witness to the education and ability of their clerks, there are none equal to those of Dalton when Deacon Wil- liams held the office.
A cousin of Col. Ephraim Williams, he was prominent in theadmin- istration of his estate, and in carrying out his designs for the founding of Williams College, of which he was one of the original and most valuable trustees.
He was a deacon of the Congregational church both in Hatfield and in Dalton. He married Miss Dorothy Ashley of Deerfield. Nine of their children survived him. He died March 1st, 1808, and was buried in the lot of his brother in-law, John Chandler Williams, in the first burial ground in Pittsfield. After two removals his remains now rest in the family lot in the Rural Cemetery of that town. His death was the occa- sion of general mourning in the county. Rev. Mr. Jennings preached a sermon at his funeral in Dalton, Rev. Mr. Shepard, of Lenox, another at his burial in Pittsfield, and Rev. Dr. West, of Stockbridge, commemo- rated his life and character in still another at Dalton in the following May. Summing up his story Dr. West said, "He was a leader and a guide to the people for many years, an ornament and glory to the town as a wise citizen and an active Christian."
But to return to the story of the town when he first became a citizen of it.
The " new plantation of Ashuelot Equivalent" was incorporated as the town of Dalton by an act of the Legislature passed March 20th, 1784. The number and beauty of the dales in the town would lead the stranger to believe that its name was derived from these ; but it was really given in honor of Hon. Tristram Dalton, then speaker of the House of Repre- sentatives, who seems to have been very popular in the town which took his name, as it gave him a unanimous vote when he was candidate for lientenant-governor. He was afterward one of the first two U. S. Sena- tors from Massachusetts under the Federal constitution.
The act of incorporation required Charles Goodridge (Goodrich), Esq .. of Pittsfield to issue his warrant to some prominent inhabitant of the Equivalent directing him to call the first meeting. The warrant was directed to Deacon Williams, and the first meeting was held at the inn of Dr. Perez Marsh, April 19th, when the following officers were chosen:
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Moderator, Joseph Chamberlin ; clerk, William Williams ; select- men, William Williams. Lieut. Eliphalet Chamberlin, Captain Cleave- Jand, Solomon Storey, Nathan Webb ; treasurer, William Williams : assessors, William Williams, Eliphalet Chamberlin, Josiah Lawence, 2d; constables, Abraham Porter, Daniel Foote ; surveyors of ways, William Cady, Joseph Chamberlin, Lieut. Nathaniel Kellogg, David Merriman. Nicholas Bartlett ; tythingmen, Eliphalet Chamberlin, Benjamin Cham- berlin, 2d ; fence viewers. Robert Wiley. Chester Marsh; sealer of leather. John Hovey ; sealer of weights and measures, Lieut. Nathaniel Kellogg; wardens, Daniel Merriman, Solomon Storey, Nathaniel Webb.
The names here given afford, probably, a fair although not a perfect indication of the position of the families prominent in the new town. By the act of incorporation it was bounded on the north by Windsor, on the west by Lanesboro and Pittsfield, on the east "by Partridgefield and Jones' grant to the north line of Washington and thence on the same line of Pittsfield." The territory thus defined was about five miles long by three wide, and comprised what is now the busy manufacturing part of the town. In the portion of Windsor next adjoining it there was, how- ever, some excellent woodland, and the spirit of annexation at once manifested itself, but a motion with regard to it, made in the meeting of January, 1785, was postponed, and the matter lingered until, at a meet- ing held February 7th, 1795, the following curious and suggestive vote was passed :
" The town again taking into consideration that article in the warrant respecting the annexing of a part of the town of Windsor, upon mature deliberation voted, that that part of the town of Windsor included in the following bounds: to wit, be- ginning at the southeast corner of Lot No. 4, and thence to extend northerly, on the east line of lots 4, 5, 12, 13, 20, 21, 28, to the southeast corner of lot 28; thence at right angles on the north line of lots 28, 90, 89, 88, 87, in a direct line on the western boundary of said town of Windsor; and thence to the southwest curve of said town, together with the inhabitants dwelling on the lands included in these lines, if they and the said town of Windsor shall consent and agree thereto, be annexed to and made part of the town of Dalton, and equally share with us in duties and privi-
leges; provided nevertheless * * * that if any of the inhabitants or proprietors of the town of Dalton shall judge it inconvenient for them to be included in the said vote, and shall decline being in all respects incorporated with that part of the town of Dalton above described, such persons may have leave, at any time within one year from this day to lodge in the hands of the town clerk * a writing *
under their hands, declaring their desire not to be included in said vote, and they shall be, both as to their persons and their estate real and personal, exempt from the costs and charges for settling and supporting the gospel ministry, and for build- ing and repairing a meeting house or meeting houses in Dalton, or in that part of
Windsor which may be annexed * * * until he, she, or they, so declining shall in writing signify his, her, or their desire to unite with the said town and share the common burthens and privileges of the town in every respect. Such person thence- forward (after such paper is filed) to be liable to be taxed their due proportion of all costs and charges that may legally be incurred for the support of the Gospel ministry, and for building and repairing a meeting house or meeting houses in said town."
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A few of the taxpayers seem to have been reluctant to add to their burdens;in the support of the gospel by the annexation of territory which might require an additional church while it would not contribute propor- tionately to the revenues of the town. This was a natural result of the compulsory support of public worship under a law which incidentally favored one denomination of Christians. Doubtless some of the recusants would have eagerly contributed to the support of the gospel as they un- derstood it, while some were avowed Deists. The vote covertly accuses all who should avail themselves of its provisions with avoiding their share of public burdens which all should bear alike.
The wording of the Dalton vote savors strongly of the independent municipal spirit which grew up in Berkshire in the Revolution.
The most suggestive fact regarding the annexation is that the 5,000 acres which it added to the town are almost entirely mountain wood- lands, without any inhabitants to this day to ask anybody to be taxed to supply them with gospel privileges. The authority of the General Court in the matter does not seem to have received much consideration.
At the meeting in 1785 $50 were voted for schooling, to be divided equally among the districts ; that a bounty of $4 should be paid to any inhabitant who should kill a wolf within the limits of the town during the next year ; and "that Joseph Chamberlin and Charles Day shall have the small-pox, but that after the tenth of April they shall not suffer any person who is not inoculated to come into their homes." The last vote was not as alarming as it appeared. It did not sentence the persons named to suffer from the small-pox, but merely permitted them to be inoculated with it in their own houses. Similar votes were frequent at this period in all Massachusetts towns, and had been for years. Small- pox was a scourge which constantly threatened the people at all points. and inoculation with its virus, even after proper preparation of the sys- tem, and the best treatment, was still dangerous to the patient, although most intelligent persons with fair courage preferred to encounter it while thus prepared rather than to ineur the danger of being infected with it by casual contact. The infection, however, could be communicated by the inoculated persons as well as by those who had taken the disease in the natural way. The jealous care with which the town watched the process was therefore not an evidence of ignorant prejudice, but only a wise sanitary precaution.
The Shays rebellion followed hard upon the organization of the town, and under the lead of Major John Wiley, one of its chiefs, it was drawn more deeply into it than most Berkshire towns, although almost all were involved in it to some extent. This, however, belongs mostly to another part of the history. It is sufficient to say here that, as to material pros- perity and internal harmony, Dalton was more severely punished for its share in the insurrection, than most towns.
£
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HISTORY OF BERKSHIRE COUNTY.
ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY.
Owing, doubtless, to the peculiar circumstances which led to the grant of the " Ashuelot Equivalent," no portion of its lands was reserved for the introduction and support of the "Gospel ministry," or for schools. The plantation, and afterward the town, were subjected only to the gen- eral laws of the State in that regard, and these were stringent enough when strictly enforced. "Meeting houses " and ministers, schools and school houses, were positively required, with severe penalties for not providing them. But what ministers to "employ," and where to locate the meeting house, were questions which divided communities into hos- tile sections and created feuds the traces of which remain even to this day. There can be no doubt, in any thoughtful mind, as to the general beneficent effect of the early laws of Massachusetts in organizing society ; but. especially after the date of the settlement of Berkshire county, they led to incidental evils, and finally to a total severance of the affairs of Church and State, greatly to the advantage of both.
Before this great change was effected, and while the building of a meeting house and the settlement and support of ministers were matters to be determined in town meetings, the fact that Dalton, with no well- defined and acknowledged center, was made up of scattered settlements or villages, which had, or fancied they had, conflicting interests, led to deplorable controversies. The whole religious, or, it may be better said, the whole ecclesiastical history of the town, for many years after its in- corporation is, so far as it is a matter of record, one of controversy, not with regard to any theological differences, but as to the location of the meeting house which the town was required by law to build, and in which the whole population of the town were supposed to worship, and gener- ally did. It cannot be supposed that men and women like those who were the earliest settlers of the Equivalent did not hold regular religious service, and frequent religious communion with each other, from the first ; but no record or tradition tells us of the place or method. Prayer meetings and meetings for exhortation there must have been in private houses, and in the school houses when they were built.
After the incorporation of the town from £25 to £30 were voted each year "to hire preaching ; " except in some years disturbed by the Shays rebellion or otherwise, when it was voted not to raise any money for such purposes. Who the preachers were who were thus hired, or what their eloquence effected, is nowhere recorded. The most remarkable case on the record is that of Rev. William Winslow Paige, who was chosen minister of the town in July, 1789, and accepted his election. In his final letter of acceptance, after due reverential acknowledgment of the divine wisdom in guiding the town, he writes :
"To the Church of Christ and Congregation in Dalton:
" I have taken into consideration the broken state that you have been in, and your being so well agreed now, and if I should leave you , it is like that you would be
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as bad or worse than ever, as a flock of sheep scattered upon the mountain, having no shepherd to guide them, I have taken advice with my friends and fathers in the ministry, give my answer in the affirmative."
Both the town and Mr. Paige seem to have been very much in earnest about the matter, and a committee was appointed to make the arrange- ment for his installation ; the town agreeing to give him £100 for settle- ment, £60 as yearly salary, and thirty-five cords of wood annually. But after all this the town the very next year voted to raise no money for preaching, and no more is heard of the Rev. Mr. Paige or of any other clergyman for some years afterward. So far as the record shows, no other candidate had been proposed in town meeting for election to the pastor- ate of the town, and there was no considerable oppostion to his election. The " broken state in which the town had been" must have arisen sim- ply from the controversy regarding the location of the meeting house, which was the one question which divided the town for many years.
There was, however, some years earlier, a curious vote of the town, which illustrates the life of that period. On the 9th of March, 1785, the town voted to hire preaching for the next year ; but to exempt from the tax for that purpose all taxpayers who had conscientious scruples about paying for it (i. e., preaching) in that way. Major John Wiley, Captain Ephraim. Cleveland, Messrs. Benjamin Gallup, Ephraim Newell, John Holmes, Daniel Day, and John Harvey, jr., pleaded conscience.
Many men in Central Berkshire at this time had, or professed to have, conscientious scruples with regard to a paid ministry, and many dissenters from the Congregational faith made revolt by remonstrance against taxation for the building of meeting houses. The trouble in Dalton, however, seems to have been caused almost entirely by the con- flicting interests of different sections with regard to location, and the de- cision, or rather indecision of this question occupied a large share of the time of town meetings for many years. In 1786 it was voted "that the building of a meeting house be postponed for the present." October 6th, -. '1788, it was voted to build a house, 35 by 40 feet, on the hill near the cor- ner of Captain Jacob Chamberlin's lot ; to raise £150 pounds within the year for materials, and that materials furnished by taxpayers be credited to them. Nathan Warner, Benjamin Gallup, Captain Parks, Lieutenant Spofford and Charles Day were appointed a building committee, and in- structed to accommodate to the utmost of their power every inhabitant in furnishing material. Ten days later the vote was to build the house 40 by 50 feet on the hill north of Charles Day's. In July, 1789, the town refused to reconsider its action ; but in September it appointed a committee "to examine into" the principles that ought to determine the place of setting a meeting house, and in December to change the location and postpone the building. In April, 1790, the town would not reconsider these votes, but requested Nehemiah Bull, Jonathan Smith, and Gideon Wheeler, Esqs., of Lanesboro, as judicious and disinterested persons, to view the town and, after hearing what might enable them to form an equal
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and just judgment, to fix a place for a meeting house. Ensign Chamber- lin was appointed to arrange with the Widow Marsh for their proper en- tertainment at her tavern. At the meeting, March 28th, 1790, the report of these referees, whatever it may have been, was rejected, and the whole matter indefinitely postponed.
The Methodist denomination, introduced into the town in 1788 or 1789, had by this time obtained a good foothold, especially in the south- west part, and that fact may perhaps help to interpret some of the votes which follow.
On the 27th of June, 1791, an extraordinary meeting was held, not upon the call of the selectmen or in the usual place, but in school Ward No. 2, which afterward became a part of Hinsdale, and by order of Eli Root, Esq., of Pittsfield, justice of the peace and the quorum. Major John Wiley was moderator and James Wing, who was some years after- ward nearly connected by marriage with Rev. Theodore Hinsdale, was clerk pro tem ; Deacon Williams, the town clerk, being conspicuously absent. The meeting voted that the part of the town south of a line drawn from Israel Peck's house on the west side, and Timothy Burt's on the east, shall be at liberty to go off and unite with other towns in · ecclesiastical privileges, and that a meeting honse be set on the hill op- posite Mr. William Buckley's, to accommodate the rest of the inhabi- tants.
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